


Don't Meet Strangers on the Internet

by littlejeanniebean



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst and Drama, F/M, Gen, Teen Romance, Teenage Drama
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-25
Updated: 2020-05-08
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:15:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23832235
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littlejeanniebean/pseuds/littlejeanniebean
Summary: Some time between Endgame and Far From Home, Shuri and Peter discover they've been Tumblr friends for ages and now they save the world together. Meanwhile, MJ is convinced she's just protective of the ever-unassuming Peter Parker as a friend...
Relationships: Betty Brant & Michelle Jones & Ned Leeds & Peter Parker, Michelle Jones/Peter Parker, Peter Parker & Shuri, Peter Parker/Shuri
Comments: 7
Kudos: 104





	1. In Which Shuri Has a Secret Tumblr

**TechPrincess01**

_ Only read this post if you have the mental headspace to deal with other people's problems. Thank you and have a lovely day. _

**sciencepunsarelife** had to scroll very far down to get to the rest of the post. Not that he had the mental energy to deal with more problems, just that he felt he couldn't stand dealing with his own for much longer. 

_ My father died today.  _

He shut his laptop with a snap. Too close. This was too close. But he and  **TechPrincess01** were friends. Online, sure, but it was all the same to him. If she lost her father today, he would… he would find a way to be there for her.

_ I'm not saying this for notes. Or for pity. Or because I want someone to talk to. I just need to work through this and get it off my chest.  _

Okay, so he would just read, which would be the online equivalent of just listening. 

_ He was killed. Shot. He always warned us about leaving home. He left home. And he was shot.  _

**sciencepunsarelife** was  _ this _ close to hyperventilating. Ben was shot. The man who became his father after his own had died beyond the reaches of his own son's memory… he was killed. The boy was angry now. He wanted to punch something. Someone. The man who took everything away from him. From May. He wanted to take something back. 

_ May my ancestors keep his soul. And may they keep me from personally ripping out his murderer's throat.  _

_ Mother is not angry, just grieving, which I don't understand. I am angry, my brother is angry. I need to do something, but Mother says we shouldn't do anything before our heads are clear. My brother's lucky not to live at home. He can just hang up on her.  _

The boy understood her feelings well. Judging by the explosive number of notes on her post, so did many others. May had said something similar. She was slowly finding some sense of normalcy in the two months since the funeral. He, however, could not take things slow. He jumped right back into school, even organized a field trip with Ned, who was great at distracting him. 

Then he got bit. Then he could actually  _ do _ something. 

He'd been face to face with his uncle's shooter. In times like this, he regretted letting him live. He could have beaten him to death. Now the murderer was serving life. But his brother still got to see him. He nor May would ever see Ben again. Not for a long time. 

_ I have come to a conclusion. A few actually.  _

_ I will never be okay with this. But I will find a way to keep his memory alive. In me. In my work. In my family.  _

_ I will let someone else serve justice. That is the only way it will truly be achieved. Otherwise, it's just vengeance.  _

_ I will want to hurt people. Sometimes not even those who are at fault. I will want them to hurt as I am hurting. But my father was a protector and even now I can feel his embrace, protecting me from my own temper. _

_ I will want to hurt myself. To distract from the unbearable. To put an end to it. I will not go through with it because if my father's life should not have been taken then neither should mine.  _

_ Thank you for reading. Take care of yourselves. _

_ -TP _

**sciencepunsarelife**

_ Thank you so much for this. I lost someone recently and haven't been able to talk to anyone about it. I probably won't ever be okay with it either, but he always believed there was more good in the world than bad. I think I can find a way to make others believe it too. Thank you again. If you ever do want to talk - about anything at all - please know you can always DM me :) _

**TechPrincess01** _likes this._

  
  
  


A few weeks later…

**TechPrincess01**

_ Have you guys seen this??? I wanna know what dem webs made of, like damn…  _

*Shaky iPhone video of Spiderman saving a firefighter saving a cat at the top of the Empire State building*

*News clipping of ‘Der Erstaunliche Klebrige Junge’ or ‘The Amazing Sticky Boy’ saving the German chancellor* 

  
**sciencepunsarelife** _ likes this. _


	2. In Which Peter's Being Weird Again

“What’s up with you, man?” 

“Hmm?” Peter looked up from his phone, “Sorry, Ned, what were you saying?”

“Look, I know the whole Liz thing hit you hard and all and then Mr. Stark just…” Ned waved his arms around but couldn’t find a tactful way to finish his sentence, “Anyway -”

“Who is she?” MJ cut in.

“Who wha...? I never said anything about anyone, who are we talking about?” Peter tried not to choke on the pudding he'd been eating. Even with his weird tingle-power thing, he never knew what to expect from MJ. How  _ long _ had she been sitting there?

“You’ve found another unhealthy obsession. It’s a classic case of transference.”

“I - I - It’s not - I’m not - we’re just  _ friends _ !” 

Ned gasped, “So there  _ is  _ someone! Good for you, Pete!” 

“We’re  _ just _ friends. I’ve known her since junior high.” 

“Whoa, whoa,  _ whoa _ ,” the other boy held up his hands dramatically, “ _ I’ve  _ known you since junior high, which means I must know  _ her _ , who  _ is _ this chick?”

“Uh, degrading much?” Betty joined MJ’s table holding a tray of Mediterranean salad with a side of Caesar salad and a fruit cup for dessert. 

“Yeah, Ned, you gotta show some respect,” said Peter. 

“You can’t be a feminist of convenience, Peter Parker,” MJ dog-eared her page. This was getting good. “We can educate Leeds, here  _ and _ get you to spill the tea at the same time.”

The boy set his jaw, “Are you saying I can’t have a platonic relationship with an intelligent, funny, sensitive...”

“No, no, go on, you were saying?” the observant girl smirked.

Suddenly, the top floor of the museum next door gave way to a gigantic marble statue that might’ve been a war horse before it’s head got broken off. The building began to topple. 

“Holy sh-where’d Peter go?” Betty was the first to turn back around. 

“Uh, his aunt said she wanted to see that exhibit today - he must’ve gone after her!” Ned thought quickly, grabbing her hand, “But we’ve gotta run before -”

Spider-man held the building upright while a massive Ant-man fought off what looked like a swarm of very persistent bees. The gigantified headless war horse, however, moved inch by inch towards the windows of Midtown’s cafeteria. 

MJ thought briefly that Ned was getting better at making up excuses for Peter’s weird behavior before she started running for her life. 

After saving thirty-nine civilians mid-fall and securing the main structural supports the young hero was out of web, but the  _ stupid _ war horse was still slipping. “Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh  _ nononono _ -”

“Hey, Spider-boy, hook me up!” an unfamiliar and decidedly human voice with a cute accent entered his comms.

“Who-”

“Above you!”

A jet so soundless and practically invisible save for rainbow-rings like those you see in oil puddles hovered above him. It’s belly didn’t open for the landing gear so much as morph into it. “Attach the horse to the chassis! I can conduct a molecular-destabilizing current through your webs and -  _ Ndenza umsebenzi wakho! _ \- Sorry, that was my brother. You got it?”

“I’m out of web fluid! But…” Peter glances at the window to his chemistry lab fifteen meters away, “I can make more! Give me two minutes?” he leapt away.

“ _ Oi _ ! What am I supposed to do in the meantime?” she yelled at him, but hers was a short-range comms hack, not because she couldn’t do better but because time was off the  _ essence _ , and yet  _ off _ Itsy-Bitsy goes without so much a  _ warning _ , leaving her to - “ _ What _ , Brother?”

“Can I say it?”

“I know where you live.” 

“I’m coming to you.”

“You’ll do no such thing, if you leave those talks now, Mother will have  _ your _ head and  _ then _ mine!”

"I'm back!" Peter swung in and did his bit.

"That took, like, thirty seconds! You said two  _ minutes _ ! I was having a straight-up meltdown!" she scolded, even as the statue disintegrated, "Dude, what are your webs  _ made _ of? I'm only reading 15% damage!"

"It was a conservative estimate. And it's a custom carbon isomer with some stuff I got from toothpaste, superglue and whatever preservatives they put in those weird sticky buns you can get on ninety-second, but I - Hold up, how do I know you're one of the good guys?"

"Oh, I don't know, maybe because I just saved your arachnid ass. Anyway, this was fun! We should team up again sometime -" 

"Wait! What's your name? I mean, clearly your tech isn't from around here…"

"... It's Shuri."

"Holy sh-"

"Iknewit! Iknewit! I  _ knew _ I shouldn't have said anything! You're probably some old dude with a weird cosplay fetish -"

"Do I  _ look _ like an old dude?" Peter checked his toned torso and limbs self-consciously. He supposed he had put on  _ some _ weight since the Blip, eating his feelings with May and yeah, maybe not doing as much friendly-neighborhood patrols as he used to - then Peter got an idea. A really, really dumb idea. Or a really good one, but before he can decide which, his mouth is moving, "My name is Peter Parker."

Shuri was silent.

"Nice to meet you, Princess," he did an awkward bow-curtsey on the roof of the museum. 

"Peter Parker?" she asked softly, "As in  **sciencepunsarelife** on Tumblr, Peter Parker? Who I was  _ just _ talking to about the inefficiency and unhygienic nature of your so-called transportation system?"

"How do you - nevermind, you're a genius. Not that I didn't think you were a genius before, but now I know exactly  _ which _ genius you are -  _ holy sh- _ "

"Yeah, yeah, don't make it weird, okay?"

"Too late, weird is my middle name. Peter Weird Parker. That's what they call me. Literally. Ask MJ or Betty or Flash - I'm gonna stop talking now. Have a nice, uh… day? Trip? I hope the global partnership talks go well!"

"Thanks, sci! I mean, Spider-Man! I mean, Peter! You know who I'm talking to. Because I'm talking to you -  _ Ndiyazi ukuba kufuneka ndiyeke ukuthetha! _ \- Sorry, I should go. I think our fans have enough pictures."

"Huh?" Peter turns to look at the crowd gathered in the street below, spotting Flash filming for his vlog, "Oh, yeah… so, uh… I'll message you?"

"Yeah," her ship glided away with the grace of a swan, as though it were moving through water instead of air.

"You know, you never describe the Quinjet with that many metaphors."

"How  _ long _ have you been listening? Ned, that was a  _ private _ conversation!" Peter didn't realize he was thinking out loud. 

"I'm your guy in the chair! I'm your wing-man! It's kind of my job."

Peter could picture him swivelling in said chair in the computer lab and hoped he'd spin out and fall on his nosy face. "Well, then where  _ were _ you when I was tangled in my own tongue and slipping in my own saliva back there?"

Honestly, Ned was enjoying the free entertainment, but he said, "Young love is  _ supposed  _ to be nervous. And it needs to come naturally. A good wing-man knows when to hang back."

"What do  _ you _ know? You haven't kissed a girl since seventh grade!" changed back into his civilian clothes in the boy's washroom back at Midtown.

"And you've kissed a girl  _ when _ ?"

Peter hung up on him. 

"Peter Parker," MJ stopped just short of smacking into him as he rounded the corner.

"Oh, no."

"Oh, yes," Betty, ever the journalist, stood five feet of pure intimidation next to her. 

"Who is she?" MJ did the MJ-squint.

Still running on his heroics-high, he lied. To MJ's squint-face. He was gonna die. "Ugh, fine, she's from Wakanda, met her through the Stark Internship, but I'm not supposed to talk about what we were working on, so don't ask anymore questions and - and this is the important part:  _ We're _ .  _ Just _ .  _ Friends _ ."

"Is he lying?" Betty stage whispered.

The MJ-squint intensified, "We shall see. We shall see, Peter Parker."

  
  


**Bonus scene:**

“Okay, but he’s wearing a new pun t-shirt,” Betty pointed out. 

“No, that’s an old shirt, but he’s never worn it with that jacket,” said MJ after a glance.

“And why does that mean he’s being catfished?”

“It’s either that or he finally developed some fashion sense.”

“... Yeah, he’s definitely being catfished.”


	3. In Which Everyone But Peter Can Pun

“Hey, kid.”

“Hey, Happy,” Peter hugged him. He’d been allowed to hug him in greeting since the blip. It was nice. Happy gave really good hugs.

“Listen, the global partnership talks went really well, so there’s this kid we want you to work on your Spider-man tech with.”

Peter’s eyes widened, flashing back to the lie he’d just blatantly told MJ the other day, “This kid wouldn’t happen to be a genius Wakandan princess, would she?”

“Yeah, how’d you know?”

The superhero shrugged, “Spidey-senses.”

“Huh. Didn’t know they could do that.”

“Me neither.”

**sciencepunsarelife:** yooooo we working together?? how cool is that??

**TechPrincess01:** you’re welcome. i swung that, i guess you could say ;)

**sciencepunsarelife:** ok that’s no fair. why are you allowed to pun when i’m not?

**TechPrincess01:** because i show restraint when i need to. see ya tomorrow, sticky-boy!

“Yo, earth to Pete!” Ned waved a hand in his face.

His friend looked up from his phone at the massive lego Ewok camp they were building, “Yeah! Peter. Here. On Earth.”

“Nah, you’re still on Venus, man,” the boy chuckled, “and I totally get not telling me in front of MJ and Betty. Smart move. MJ would keep it to herself just to be smug about being right, but Betty would broadcast it to the whole school, so -”

“And  _ you _ wouldn’t?”

“What? Keep it to myself or broadcast it?”

“Uh, the second one?” Peter made a ‘duh’ face with his eyebrows raised to his gelled hairline and his small mouth hanging open just a bit.

“I would  _ never _ . A bro keeps his bro's secrets for  _ life _ .”

“Uh huh,” Peter added a few more blocky leaves to one of the trees, “What about the time you told MJ it was me who punched the wall in my sleep on pajama day?”

“That was different. That woman has me scared for my life.”

“Or the time you told MJ that it was me who put the spider in Flash’s locker on April Fools?”

“Hey, she did her creepy MJ-smile where she doesn’t show her teeth, which means you have her respect.”

“Now I just need to earn some for my privacy.”

“Look, all the times I’ve ever told MJ anything -”

“Those are a lot of times, man.”

“- were because I had no choice! With a _single_ _squint_ , she can see into my _very_ _soul_!”

Peter sighed. He could argue more, but he had to agree. Let’s put it this way, if MJ ever got superpowers, he would just quit - hang up the suit, let it gather dust in his closet - because crime would just end and everyone would have everything they could ever want or need.

“So does this mean you’re not telling me?” Ned pouted.

“Normally? Yes. But these are extraordinary circumstances because I’m meeting her tomorrow and I need your advice -”

“Don’t wear a pun t-shirt.”

“I take it back. You don’t get to know -”

“You wanted my advice!”

“ _ Good _ advice!”

“That  _ is _ good advice! Now I’ve held up my end of the bargain, who  _ is _ she?”

Peter bit his bottom lip, “Take it to the grave?”

“I swear on my limited edition DVD box set.”

“Which one?”

“The Prequel Series?”

“Is that all my confidence is worth to you, man?”

“Fine, the originals! But this better be good.”

“Princess Shuri of Wakanda.”

“Holy  _ shit _ !”

“Language!” called Aunt May casually, eyes never leaving the Great British Bake Off in the living room.

“This is why you can’t tell anyone. And the lie I told MJ is close enough - well, it actually  _ is _ the truth now - but you still can’t tell her that she’s the princess, okay?”

“ _ Damn _ , my boy is gettin’ with a  _ princess _ !” Ned slapped his knee.

“ _ Shh _ !” Peter leapt to cover his mouth and listened for sounds of May, but the bake off was still on, in fact a rather heated argument as started, so they were good. “And actually, don’t even say it like that. We’re just friends.”

“No, now you’re friends who are working together! The next step is a heated makeout session while one or both of you is wearing nothing but a lab coat.”

“You and I are friends who work together. Literally all the time.”

“And if either of us swung that way, I’m sure it woulda happened,” Ned chuckled to himself, “Heh. Swung that way. That’s good.”

Peter threw his hands up in the air in exasperation. 

His friend either didn’t or refused to take notice, “Okay, let’s get you Queer-Eyed for your date -”

“First day of work.”

“Eh, tomato, tomahto.”

Peter had to admit as he walked through the shiny doors that led to the shiny lobby that led to the shiny elevator of Stark Towers that Ned knew what he was doing. He’d never actually been to the towers except to receive his fake - but technically real in ways he couldn’t talk about - internship plaque and he’d had May to make him presentable then. And literally everyone was in a fitted suit and tie. He couldn’t cover the ‘fitted’ part on his budget, but he thought he made it work. 

He let himself into the secure floor for Avengers business and was taken aback by the sheer mess of it. It was a mess that made his geeky heart race, but a mess nonetheless. It looked like no one had been there since… since Tony. 

“Yoooo, what are  _ those _ ?” Shuri came out from behind a suddenly arisen screen of sandy molecules - Vibranium. She was gesturing critically at his formal wear and herself was wearing a stylish crop top, leather skirt and knee-high boots. 

Peter grimaced and quickly shrugged off his jacket and yanked his tie over his head, “Bad advice.”

She giggled, which was a very strange sound that contrasted her gravelly voice. But it was strange in a good way. Everything about her was strange in a good way. It's why she was so brilliant and funny and -

Oh.

_ Oh. _

_ Oh no. _

"What are you standing around gaping like a fishy for? We've got our work cut out for us," she grabbed his suddenly very clammy hand and led him further into the mess of storage. 

Tomato, tomahto indeed. 


	4. In Which MJ Scares Herself

"Yo, Sci," a girl with an accent stood in front of Peter's desk.

His head shot up with a thousand-watt grin that made MJ raise her eyebrows, "Techie! What are you doing here?"

"Eh," she shrugged, plopping into the empty seat next to him, "my brother thinks I'm here to shrink my head a bit and learn to be a kid, but I'm  _ really _ here to kick ass and fight God."

"I think your head is beau-" his eyes widened at the word that almost made it out of his mouth, but she heard it - of course she did and said beautiful head tilted to the side in reaction - so he bit the bullet, "-tiful...ly proportionate." Thank every god and ultra-powerful being Flash doesn't take AP Chem.

MJ  _ was _ there lazily cracking her fingers, though, so this would crop up at some unfortunate crossroads in his future. 

Shuri giggled. That sound that did him in made his face turn into jelly that couldn't stop smiling to save his life. Didn't matter, though, because she could save them both without breaking a sweat. Literally. She'd just have her tech do it.

"So I guess a Wakandan Princess has no reason to catfish a kid from Queens," Betty was bored at the perceivably boring conclusion to their investigative efforts.

MJ only grunted in response, which was perceivably normal.

Peter had an alphabetized dictionary of her many expressions, mentally catalogued over years of study since she saved him from certain death on a little league soccer field in junior high and then proceeded to outright ignore him or just be plain rude. 

_ Eyebrows _ \- I'm interested or I'm jealous. Obviously, it had to be the former because she'd been invested in figuring out his disappearing act. 

_ Fingers  _ \- I'm trying to concentrate or I'm trying to distract myself. Obviously, again, the former. They had a quiz today and it looked like she was going over the notes one last time. 

_ Grunt _ \- I'm bored or I'm scared. Obviously, yet again, the former, because he once saw her running away from a ten-foot-tall alien with a dead-straight face. The only time he'd ever seen her scared was the decathlon elevator fiasco in DC.

In truth, what was obvious to Peter was absolutely wrong. MJ  _ was _ jealous and she wasn't sure why at first, but that was how she felt when she saw the way Peter looked at the girl named Shuri. And they had pet names for each other, which was disgusting, right? 

So she tried to distract herself from the feeling. From the pull she always felt to watch Peter Parker's every move because boi was fragile and needed some serious help and that was  _ it _ ! 

Then she understood why she was jealous when Betty had spoken. He wasn't being manipulated. He was just… feeling things... for her. And MJ  _ was _ scared because  _ she _ was… feeling things… for him. 

And her only female friend would divulge her secret in five seconds flat so she couldn't even get her advice. Rats.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thinking of posting Peter's complete MJ-expression dictionary? Would that be interesting? Let me know in the comments?


	5. In Which There is an Epic Battle

“You ready, Sticky-boy?” Shuri stretched and bounced on the balls of her feet back at headquarters like  _ she _ was the one about to fight mutant lizards in a prototype suit made by two bonus-feature-happy teens. 

It wasn’t that Peter didn’t think that her tech and his chemistry were a solid pair. He just really wanted to look good and not have any embarrassing tumbles where he couldn’t stick the landing or run-ins with a billboard or -

“Wait.  _ Those _ are the lizards?” the boy crouched down to get a better look at the three-inch house lizards. One in particular stopped to blink up at him, “You’re not so bad, are you, little guy?”

“Hang on,” Shuri’s voice came through tight, “I’m getting some weird bio-readings -”

“ _ Agh _ !”

“Peter, I’ve lost visual! What happened?”

“Suit’s down!”

“ _ What _ ?  _ How _ ?”

“I still have comms ‘cause you put it on a separate system - good call, by the way - but the suit’s down and won’t reboot.”

“Do you still have webs?” 

“Yeah,” he used the electric ones to short out the shock-inducing lizards and fry them like fish, “Need to lead them away from the power grid!”

“I’ll get you a route. I’ll send it to you after I reboot your suit remotely.”

“Ah, shit.”

“What now?” Shuri asked just as the power went out in the towers, “Why is the backup generator not kicking in?”

“They got to the power grid,” Peter is out of breath, swinging to transport not just his weight, but the weight of his new and out of commission Vibranium suit, “If the generator’s not on by now, I think they’re travelling by the sewers and are all over the city already.”

“Ah, but if they’re in the sewers, we just need to put a little shock into the system.”

“But people are using that water!”

“Relax, sci, I’ll just hack the providers and pull the plug temporarily,” Shuri began running a program from her Kimoyo beads, “Keep ‘em busy!”

“Yeah, yeah,” Peter led a hoard of lizards one shock-web at a time to a field upstate before using his comms to call Shuri’s jet to fry them, “They follow the electricity, Techie!” 

“Gotcha,” said Shuri, “I’ll attract ‘em all down to the sewers before I start cooking - oh,  _ shit _ !”

“ _ Shuri _ ?” Peter raced back to the city.

“They feed on it too!” she dove under the table as glass and metal rained down, “There’s a Godzilla outside my window -  _ shit _ ! Who comes  _ up _ with these things and thinks: Oh, what a good idea, I’m going to bring  _ that _ into the world!”

“Another mission for another  _ time _ ,  _ maybe _ ?”

“Water’s spiked!” Shuri reports, “Yes, he’s leaving! Or she. Oooh, that’s not good -  _ Pete _ ?”

“I see it!” ‘It’ being their Godzilla tearing up the pavement in the warehouse district to try to get underground. 

“Everybody out!” Spiderman escorts workers out, plucking debris from the sky as it falls and flinging it at the still-tiny lizards scampering about so they don’t shock the escaping civilians. 

“Peter, it’s just Godzilla left on the surface, but if I don’t scorch the ones underground already, we’re going to have several teenaged Godzillas running around New York -”

“Do it. I got Zilla.”

“Done. No other weird bio-readings… I’ll send them to my lab at home to figure out later. It’s really a remarkable feat of engineering -”

“Uh, huh. Would love to hear about it. But I’d like my suit back more.”

“Oh,  _ shit _ , right. One sec,” a low groaning of metal can be heard through her comms.

Peter didn't stop making his shock-web net at the end of the street because the lizard was starting to take notice and lumber towards him.

“Pete, where the  _ fuck _ is my jet?”

“Oh, shit, I left it in the field upstate!” he called it back.

“You  _ what _ ?”

“You were screaming about Godzilla and I just -”

“Well, now I’m going to  _ die _ from falling fifteen stories because no ship can travel forty kilometers in three minutes!”

“I have an idea. Ready with my suit?”

“Yes, because I’m the responsible one between us -”

“Gimme my suit on three,” he flipped away from the net just as the lizard crashed into it.

“Three!” he landed on the lizard’s back as the lights came back on, “Karen, divert power to shock-webs!”

_ Thwip! Thwip!  _ The webs lodged themselves onto the thick green scales and the lizard crumpled to the ground, smoking. 

“Karen, fastest route to Stark Towers! How’s the building holding, Techie?”

“Sci, if I die, tell my brother to beat yo ass for me.”

“That’s fair,” the slanting building is in his sights, “Karen, locate Shuri.”

He swings in through one of the broken windows in time with it’s falling rate. His body collides with his partner’s just as she loses her grip on a thick supporting post and he swings them up and out the other side. 

“ _ Holy _ shit! Holy  _ shit _ !” she screamed and their comms started ringing in their ears from the proximity.

“Agh,” they both groaned at the same time as Spiderman found a suitably abandoned penthouse roof to land on.

“Ow,” Peter touched his chest to pack away the Vibranium suit. He was sore in places he’d forgotten existed since the battle against Thanos. 

“You okay?” Shuri followed him into a kneeling position, her voice softer and kinder.

“Yeah,” he winced, but managed to look up at her with a wry smile, “Scan before you touch, huh?”

“Good idea,” she did a quick medical scan of his injuries, “The only thing you didn’t hurt was your face. That’s convenient.”

“Why is that -”

She leaned in and kissed him. He kissed back. Her lips were moving, his lips were moving. Then they pulled apart and neither was much out of breath. 

“Huh,” she sat back on her haunches, a puzzled expression on her face.

“Anything?” he frowned, wondering why he didn’t feel as light headed as when Liz had kissed him on the cheek before she left town.

“Nothing, you?”

“Nada," he flushed and added quickly, "but you’re still really cute.”

“So are you,” she assured him.

“So… what do we do now?”

“We continue being kick-ass partners in fighting crime without the unnecessary complications of a relationship?”

“Sounds perfect, partner,” he grinned at her.

Then she grew serious and wagged her finger in his face, "Don't take my jet without permission ever again."

He nodded and sheepishly offered her a swing back to the brownstone she shared with her brother while they were in town. 

"Wheeeee!" Shuri cheered this time, her braids whipping in the wind. 


	6. In Which There are More Tomatoes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If the title doesn't make much sense to you, read Chapter 3 first :)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING!!! IT'S BECAUSE OF YOU THAT THIS ONE-SHOT BECAME A TWO-SHOT BECAME A MULTICHAP!!! I'm open to doing more Peter x Shuri or Peter x MJ anytime, so leave me a comment or hit me up on Tumblr @littlejeanniebean if you've got a request :)

“Ah, sorry,” there was a spark when Peter and MJ’s fingers brushed against each other in their biology lab. He was sparking everyone and everything he touched since the lizards.

“S’fine,” mumbled MJ, "So…"

"Yeah, I've got the pipettes and test tubes labeled, we can start -"

"How was your weekend?" she asked at the same time.

"My - oh," Peter thought quickly, "Aunt May had the exterminators come in for lizards and Ned and I watched all the Godzilla movies ever made and objectively ranked them best to worst."

"Do you always pick your movie marathons based on who visits?"

"Pfft, no," he made a face, slipping easily into the lie, squashing down the guilt that would eat him up later, "If we did, we'd be alternating between  _ My Best Friend's Wedding _ and  _ The Notebook _ in perpetuity."

She smirked, "Until an exterminator comes along."

"Exactly. How was  _ your _ weekend?"

"Oh, uh, hold on this is a time sensitive portion," she grabbed a pair of tongs and lowered a test tube into a beaker in boiling water.

It was Peter's turn to smirk at her, "You do know that's how a friendly conversation usually goes, right? You ask a question, the other person gets to -"

"Quick, vortex this," she passed the tongs off to him and he complied.

"How about this, I guess how you spent your weekend and you have to tell me if I'm right or not," he took her silence as a go-ahead, "You… read a book…”

“That’s the best you can do?” she raised an eyebrow.

“Well, normally friends just  _ tell _ you how their weekend went and you finished re-reading  _ Lord of the Flies _ again on Friday, so I don’t really have much else to go on. By the way, why do you like that book so much? It’s depressing.”

“It holds a lot of good memories for me,” she said quietly, vulnerably almost, and had she said it any other way - perhaps accompanied with a bored pout or a shrug - he would have looked at her like she was nuts. 

“You’re probably the only person who has good memories from junior high, I’m happy for you,” he said sincerely and at the same time in a tone that was meant to lighten the mood. 

MJ swallowed hard and took a deep breath for courage. She cast Peter a sideways glance to see if he noticed - he hadn’t, he was being a good lab partner and timing their sample. Then she said, “That’s when I met you and Ned. You were… kind of the first people who didn’t actively try to avoid me.”

The boy smiled at her, rather proud of her for opening up.

The girl cleared her throat and if she had been wearing glasses instead of goggles, she would have been looking over them with soul-piercing accuracy, “I’m surprised that you didn’t mention a date with a certain Wakandan princess in your weekend recap.”

“Wha-no, no, we’re just friends. Really,” he said, “and I believe we were talking about  _ your  _ weekend.”

“Don’t worry,” she leaned in, her apple cider shampoo tickling his nostrils while her curly hair actually tickled his cheek, “I’m not going to hold you hostage to get to her.”

“Well, good, ‘cause like I said, we’re not a thing, so I’d be in a pretty lousy expendable position,” Peter chuckled nervously.

“Sorry, that was a really bad joke, wasn’t it?” MJ retreated, tucking back a strand that had stubbornly popped loose from her ponytail.

“No, no… it… you might want to tone down the evil grin a bit?”

“I mean, I  _ could _ , but think about how much  _ more _ creepy it would be if I talked about taking you hostage while doing this,” she smiled wide, looking like a cupcake with dimples -  _ dimples _ \- and crinkles by her eyes that were almost completely shut due to said smile. 

Peter’s senses were going haywire, but at the same time he felt his jaw go lax and his palms grow sweaty. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from MJ in her grunge band t-shirt, black skinny jeans, and leather jacket, looking like a  _ freaking cupcake _ in bulky lab goggles and a puffy ponytail - 

Oh.

_ Oh. _

_ Oh no. _

“So… back to your weekend?” he managed.

“It was good, thanks,” she said, all perky, like nothing was amiss, “Pass the pipette?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and cue the hijinks that ensue full-force in Far From Home...


End file.
